Fiametta Michaelis

Fiametta was the lover of Cesare Borgia. In 1492, she was impregnated by her lover, who visited her after he was sent to Pisa from Rome during the riots following Pope Innocent VIII's death. Borgia felt that he had broken a bargain between God and his father, Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, by impregnating a woman outside of marriage. When she gave birth to the boy, she decided to name him "Cesare", so that she could keep her husband's name close to him at all times. However, Cesare took the child and abandoned it on a cliffside to die, intending to keep his "purity". Fiametta hit him twice with a fire stoker after he refused to tell her where their son was, and an injured Cesare told her that their child was with God. Cesare later discovered that his son had been saved, but when he returned to Fiametta's house to tell her, he caught her having sex with another man, and he left his lover behind.